Let's (not) kick butt.
Plastic straw ban? Cigarette butts are the greatest source of ocean trash.
– reported CNN (25th Jan, 2019)
Cigarette butts have been the single most collected item on the world’s beaches, with 4.5 trillion cigarettes dropped on streets worldwide. More than 3 million adults smoke in the Netherlands and 2 out of every 3 cigarettes end up wrongly disposed of. Today cigarette butts are clogging the oceans, leaching multitudes of harmful toxins, and endangering marine life. With more and more people succumbing to smoking due to increased levels of stress, cigarette butts as waste are nowhere close to vanishing.
material exploration
Having collected cigarette butts from the streets and cleaned them using ecological agents, an extensive study was carried out to explore the potential of the material. Right from dissecting it and treating it to be toxin free and safe for human contact, to blending it and casting it in various materials – scoping for potential to add value to what was otherwise quite simply, trash. The result of this was a wide range of products: paper, coasters, and organizers to name a few. To tap into a resource that is widely available and in such abundance is a golden opportunity that should be zeroed in on.
project duration : 4 months. completed in June, 2019.
done as a part of my exchange semester at Design Academy Eindhoven.
